For many years we had noticed, dashing along the Highway 65 between Golani Junction and Kfar Tavor, extensive stone ruins on either side of the road at Beit Keshet. The highway in this region follows the shift in the ancient route from Cairo to Damascus, during Ottoman times, through 'Uyun at-Tujjār, and it is here that the ruins lie. They are in fact the remains of a khān or caravansarai (on the east of the road) and its protective castle (on the hill on the west of the road).
Above left: Khān al-Tawjār viewed from Kelaet al-Khān; right: Kelaet al-Khān viewed from Khān al-Tawjār.
Khān al-Tawjār (or al-Tujjār)―also known as Suq al-Khān―was one of a string set up along the road. Both the khan and the castle on the hill opposite―Kelaet al-Khan, meaning "Castle of the Khan"―were built here by Grand Vizier Sinan Pasha, around 1581. The castle had a good vantage around in all directions, and protected the isolated and low-lying khan from attacks. But it is interesting that it was not built only for the direct convenience of travellers, but also to encourage a change in the local Bedouin culture, which put lives and trade at risk.
An Ottoman document of 1581 records that the qadis of Damascus, Safed (Tsfat) and Acre (Akko), as well as the Bey of the Sanjak of Safed, reported to the Sultan that:
"the place named 'Uyun at-Tujjār near Mount Tabor, through which [many] merchants pass, is a meeting place of rebellious Bedouins, and other trouble-makers and highway robbers. They descend on the roads of the Muslims who are making Pilgrimage to Jerusalem and Hebron and other Egyptian merchants, plunder goods and chattels from them, also kill and insult many of them, capture their wives and families and do not cease to do considerable harm."
They went on to suggest a solution which is familiar today: to bring in settlements to guard against such violence. They suggested that, if a fortified caravanserai were built and "soldiers are stationed in each of [its] towers, the said place will become inhabited and cultivated."
The khan has been the subject of various travellers, surveyors and archaeologists, and the regular fair or market held there is the subject of a print, pictured below. The Ottoman traveller and explorer, Derviş Mehmed Zillî, known as Evliya Çelebi, visited in 1649, and reported in his Seyâhatnâme ("Book of Travel") as follows.
"It is a square, perfect fortress, built of masonry in the midst of a large, verdant meadow. It has a circumference of six hundred paces. The garrison consists of a warden and 150 men. It has a 'double' iron gate facing north. Inside the fortress are between forty and fifty rooms for the garrison. Inside the fortress is the Mosque of Sinan Pasha, an artistically constructed work, with a lead roof, full of light. Its windows have light blue glass enamel fixed symmetrically with rock crystal and crystal (?). It measures eighty feet each side. The sanctuary has three graceful and lofty minarets—Praise be to the Creator, as if they were three young coquettish muezzins—and seven high domes. The wayfarers are lavishly given a loaf of bread and a tallow candle for each person, and a nosebag of barley for each horse—free of charge. On either side of the fortress is a caravanserai with eight shops."
Although by the early 18th century there was a period where the area may have been deserted—there was no weekly market—western travellers still noted two buildings, one with a mosque and bath inside, and one which had been used for goods and cattle.
In the early 1760s the Italian traveller, Giovanni Mariti visited the khan. In his Travels Through Cyprus, Syria, and Palestine; with a General History of the Levant, which was translated into English in 1792, he wrote:
"...you arrive at El-Net-Tesgiar, or the Place of Merchants. I was very much struck with the elegance and magnificence of its walls. Incrusted with the most beautiful marble, which the hand of art has disposed with much taste [...] El-Net-Tesgiar is enlivened by a very flourishing commerce. A fair is held here every Monday, which is resorted to by merchants from various countries. It is well furnished with cloth, cattle, and provisions of every kind; and in this respect it is, indeed, not inferior to the richest markets in Europe.
Pierre Jacotin—in his 1799 campaign map, Carte topographique de l'Egypte—marked the place as Kan Ouioun el Touggar. James Silk Buckingham, the author, journalist and traveller who later found fame as a pioneer among the Europeans who fought for a liberal press in India, visited the place in around 1816. In his Travels in Palestine—published five years later—he described how, on a Monday, they found nearly five thousand people assembled around the khan, in addition to numerous herds of cattle.
The American scholar, Edward Robinson, visited in 1838, a day after the weekly Monday fair which had "drawn away from their home a large portion of the people of Nazareth." In his 1841 book co-authored with Eli Smith, Biblical Researches in Palestine, Mount Sinai and Arabia Petraea: A Journal of Travels in the year 1838, he described two large buildings, one the khan, and one a building "looking more like a castle."
In 1859, Dr William McClure Thomson—the American Protestant missionary working in Ottoman Syria—found that although the khan was very busy on market day, it was otherwise "entirely deserted" and that "caravans do not spend the night there for fear of Arabs, who are always prowling about, watching for an opportunity to rob." Indeed he continues that he has "never halted there for half an hour without having some of these rascals pass along, and scrutinize my party closely, to see whether or not it would do to attack us." Thomson wrote of market day in his best-selling travelogue (from which the above is quoted), The Land and the Book: Or, Biblical Illustrations Drawn from the Manners and Customs, the Scenes and Scenery, of the Holy Land, as follows.
"On Monday of each week a great fair is held at the khans, when, for a few hours, the scene is very lively and picturesque. These gatherings afford an excellent opportunity to observe Syrian manners, customs, and costumes, and to become acquainted with the character and quality of Syrian productions. Thousands of people assemble from all parts of the country, either to sell, trade or purchase. Cotton is brought in bales from Nablus; barley, and wheat, and sesamum, and Indian corn from Huleh, the Hauran, and Esdraelon. From Gilead and Bashan, and the surrounding districts, come horses and donkeys, cattle and flocks, with cheese, leben, semen, honey and similar articles. Then there are miscellaneous matters, such as chicken and eggs, figs, raisins, apples, melons, grapes and all sorts of fruits and vegetables in season. The pedlars open their packages of tempting fabrics, the jeweller is there with his trinkets; the tailor with his ready-made garments; the shoemaker with his stock, from rough, hairy sandals to yellow and red Morocco boots; the farrier is there with his tools, nails, and flat iron shoes, and drives a prosperous business for a few hours; and so does the saddler, with his coarse sacks and gaily-trimmed cloths. And thus it is with all the arts and occupations known to this people.... But long before sunset not a soul of this busy throng remains on the spot. All return home, or to take refuge in some neighbouring village."
Thomson, like several other travellers, speaks of two khans, referring to the castle as being both a fortification and a caravanserai in its own right. Certainly the castle enclosure is vast, though the lower khan is larger, and has the advantages of being on the roadside and possessing a well (now dry).
Victor Guérin wrote about his 1875 visit to the khan in his 1880 account, Description Géographique Historique et Archéologique de la Palestine, describing and measuring the two buildings. In 1881, when the Palestine Exploration Fund's Survey of Western Palestine described the site, they found that, as Thomson had noted two decades earlier, it was no longer a working caravanserai, though a market was held there each Thursday. The khan finally was abandoned completely in 1902.
Today both the khan and the castle are in disrepair, though the former has undergone excavation and repair work, especially during 1993-1994. Both structures have suffered loss of their masonry to secondary use—especially the high quality basalt and limestone ashlar facing which remains in few places.
In August 2019, a dozen Circassian school pupils from nearby Kafr Kama took part in an archaeological dig at the khan. Unusually for such involvement, they received wages which partially funded their "roots" journey to the Caucasus. The boys themselves managed the excavation site, gaining experience in drawing, measuring, documentation and all stages of the excavation.
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